


Through the Flames We Run

by alpha_exodus



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Auror Draco Malfoy, Floo Network, Floo Network Malfunction, H/D Pottermore Fair 2015, HP: EWE, M/M, Pining Draco, Post-Hogwarts, Romance, unusual careers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-14
Updated: 2015-10-14
Packaged: 2018-04-21 11:50:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4828082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alpha_exodus/pseuds/alpha_exodus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Random chance sends the opportunity to work with Potter straight into Draco's lap, and he doesn't exactly mind. But then the disappearances start, and as they strive to solve a case that becomes increasingly sinister as time goes on, Draco's thoughts become filled with both Potter and the little girl that happened upon Draco in quite the same way as Potter did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Through the Flames We Run

**Author's Note:**

> For [Prompt #82](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oKxFrF86d2c3FuVesbbG1NW8mLM0kphzpOwJLy225kY/edit).
> 
> This fic came out very differently than I'd first anticipated. It took a month's worth of writer's block to realize that the direction I was heading in was probably the wrong one, but I got back on track and I'm happy with the result! Prompter, the moment I read the 'Additions' to your prompt (Something evil roams the Floo network...), I knew it was the one, because I immediately saw spiraling into several different directions. It was only a matter of deciding which way to go!
> 
> Ever so much thanks to the extremely patient and wonderful mods. Eternal love to you guys. And thanks as well as to my lovely betas, mangoapplepie and momnar!

Fifteen years ago, when whispers of Voldemort haunted the wizarding world, the streets were desolate. No one wanted to leave their homes—home was the safest place to be, with the protection of wards and intruder alarms and as many charms and traps as possible.

This time, it’s not like that.

Draco remembers travelling to Diagon for his school supplies when Voldemort had been the threat, remembers boarded up stores and the deadness of the streets. Now, as he hurries through the Alley, he has to push past the hordes of people that roam the cobbled sidewalks. Diagon isn’t bustling. That isn’t the word for it. There are more people around than ever, but they’re not there to gossip or shop, not there for pleasure or fun. They’re there to escape.

A manic sort of despair shows in many of the faces he looks upon, even as shuttered eyes spy the Auror badge on his robes and bodies move aside so he can pass. And really, there’s nothing he can do to quell their fears, though he wishes he could. But he’s scared too.

He’s running on caffeine and adrenaline, paranoia at his back and terror in his lungs. The future he envisions grows worse and worse as time goes on. It’s too late to focus on staying calm; his fears have already been propelled beyond his control. He imagines that the wizarding economy could completely collapse if everyone continues avoiding their jobs and homes, avoiding anywhere with a fireplace. He just hopes it doesn’t come to that.

-X-

Draco thinks about the beginning of the Seizing, wincing at the realization that it was less than a month ago.

It all started with a simple misdirection. Well, with many simple misdirections, but for Draco it’s one specific misdirection that starts the whole cascade of sinister events. He thinks it’s funny, in an ironic sort of way, how that misdirection had ended up with Harry Potter in his lap.

“Er… ‘Lo, Malfoy,” Potter says. Draco blinks at him, his book having landed halfway across the floor. He’s torn between surprise and annoyance and maybe just a little bit of arousal (it’s been a while since he’s had a warm body in his lap, and the firewhisky he’d been drinking isn’t helping), but he supposes that this is what he gets for choosing to read so close to the fireplace.

“What the bloody fuck, Potter?”

Potter shifts, turning to look at the fireplace from where he’d come. Draco takes a moment to properly look at the man, and he’s surprised to find that Potter looks very fit and possibly even attractive and—and honestly, if he doesn’t get off of Draco right this moment then this is going to become very awkward indeed. So Draco shoves him off. Potter doesn’t seem fazed, even as he sprawls on the floor next to Draco. “This is your house?”

Draco pushes himself upwards into a much more dignified position before bothering with a response. “Of course it’s my house, Potter! Can we move beyond the obvious and get to the part where you’re breaking and entering? I _am_ an Auror, you know. I can arrest you.” Draco huffs, thoroughly annoyed.

“Hold on. What’s your Floo address?” Potter’s brow creases, as if he is deep in thought. Ha. Potter. Deep in thought. In the same sentence.

Draco waits for the wave of pleasure from mentally jeering at Potter to hit him, but it never comes, and he sighs. He’s far too old for bullying to be fun any more, and if he’s being honest with himself, he’s only feeling the urge to taunt Potter because he’s distinctly embarrassed over his sudden surge of attraction toward the man.

He sighs internally and answers Potter’s question. “It’s ‘Dragon’s Nest’… Oh, shut it, Mother named it when I moved in.” Draco scowls at Potter’s poorly hidden snort.

Potter smirks, but he soon grows solemn again. “That’s odd, though. There’s no chance I accidentally said that.” He frowns. “Mine’s ‘12 Grimmauld Place’, and that has a different number of syllables, even.” He gets up, peering at the Floo as if it would spit out the answers he was looking for just as it had spit him out only a moment ago.

“I’m sure it was a simple mistake.” Draco sighs, standing as well. He’s beginning to grow tired, and his bed sounds more and more appealing with every tick of his grandfather clock.

Now, his bed with Potter in it, on the other hand… Hold it, he’s not going to go down this path tonight. He doesn’t _really_ want to imagine fucking his old school rival, does he?

…apparently, he does, because his mind goes on without his permission, imagining Potter slowly baring his skin and mouthing Draco’s name. _Oh._

“But that shouldn’t happen!” Potter is saying, and he’s right. Draco shouldn’t be having these sorts of thoughts right now. “The Floos don’t work like that. I should know, it’s my job to know that,” Potter continues.

Oh. Right. The Floo. Merlin, he needs to get laid. “Well, whatever the problem is, could you possibly not figure it out in my living room?” Draco appeals to Potter, because Potter is getting dangerously close to getting thoroughly snogged ( _with his bitten lips and messy hair and robes that actually fit for once_ ) and he doesn’t even know it.

“Yeah, sure, Malfoy,” Potter murmurs, reaching for the Floo powder and then thinking better of it. “Actually, never mind.” He shakes his head. “It’s probably better to Apparate. Do you have anti-wards up?”

“No,” Draco answers, but his voice is a little too husky, and in that moment Potter actually _looks_ at him for the first time that night. He looks back, swallowing thickly and wondering if Potter can see his partial arousal. It’s not his fault he’s always maybe sort of wanted Potter to want him.

Maybe Potter notices, and maybe he doesn’t, because he simply breathes a smile at Draco, one that (Draco has to admit) sets him a bit off-kilter. “How’s Auror life?” Potter asks, no matter that he’s never asked after Draco before, or that he’d just said he was leaving.

“Hectic,” Draco answers truthfully, and Potter looks a little wistful at that.

“I thought that would be me, one day,” he says. “And then my life didn’t seem to want to lead me that way, and so I let it pull me somewhere different instead. And here I am.”

It’s so unfair, that a man like Potter can manage to be ruggedly attractive and effortlessly philosophical all at once. And it’s unfair that Draco’s finding himself even more drawn to him because of all that.

“I like chasing people,” he admits to Potter, and if it comes out more as a come-on than as a remark about his job, he’s not going to deny it. Potter’s irresistible, always has been.

Realization sparks in Potter’s eyes, sending flames from Draco’s heart to his fingertips. He knows.

Draco’s heartbeat quickens even though he’s not really sure he wants to do this with _Potter_ of all people. But before he can make a decision, the clock chimes midnight, making them both jump.

“I should get home,” Potter murmurs, and Draco doesn’t think he’s imagining the wistful tone in Potter’s voice.

“Probably,” Draco agrees. And then Potter does something unexpected and reaches out to put a hand on Draco’s shoulder. Nothing more—he just holds it there, and the warmth spreads through Draco’s body, ending decidedly in his groin.

“We should get drinks sometime,” Potter offers, and then gives a nervous smile.

Draco almost groans; of _course_ Potter’s the chivalrous, date-before-you-fuck kind of bloke. But he really shouldn’t have expected anything different, and as much as his libido disagrees, it’s kind of endearing in a way.

“All right,” he answers, and Potter takes his hand away and Disapparates with a grin.

Draco spells the ashes off of the floor, marks his place in his book, and manages to make it all the way to his bed before his mind overwhelms him with wanting. Potter, of all people, is suddenly the most attractive man he can think of. It’s completely disarming, but there’s nothing he can do now—the damage has already been done.

He closes his eyes and relives the memory of Potter’s body in his lap.

-X-

In the morning, Draco is distinctly embarrassed when remembering the events of the prior night. He spells himself a glass of water, shakes off his guilt, and washes away his misgivings in the shower.

His workday is mostly paperwork from yesterday’s case, and he can’t help but wish that he had something more engaging to do so that he doesn’t have room to obsess over whether Potter will owl him or not.

It’s not until he gets home that he remembers all the oddness with the Floo. And he probably wouldn’t have remembered at all except that the problem seems to have happened again, seeing as there’s a small girl sobbing in front of his fireplace.

He immediately recoils. Children are _not_ his forte. They’re sticky and loud and operate under a form of logic that may as well be another language, for all he can understand it.

But the child doesn’t disappear, and she’s still crying, so he supposes there’s no help for it. He quickly slips out of his work robes and stows them in the closet, safely away from any child associated stickiness before striding over to her.

She’s peeking at him through her shaking hands, blonde hair plaited messily and wearing mismatched shades of orange.

“Hello,” he says, because he really has no idea what to do and it seems as good of a place to start as any.

The child only wails louder.

Maybe he should kneel down? He’s heard somewhere that adults can look intimidating to children if they’re too tall, and he _is_ over six feet. So he kneels, and in that moment he realizes that he recognizes her.

He’d been the Auror on duty for a missing items report a few weeks beforehand. It’d simply been a case of an elderly woman misplacing her glasses in a shop on Diagon, but he’d still been required to fill out all of the necessary forms in triplicate (he feels a twinge of annoyance even thinking about it). The girl in front of him had been playing with a toy dragon of the same model as one he’d had as a child, else he wouldn’t have remembered her at all. But this close up, he’s pretty sure it’s the same one. Thank goodness—that means he can take her home quickly and easily, since the address should be on file at the office. No harm done.

Now, if only he can remember her name. What had her grandmother called her?

“Adelaide?” he tries, speaking cautiously in an effort not to scare her even further.

She shakes her head, sobbing louder. Damn it.

Before he can come up with another plan of action, she speaks. “My name’s… not Adelaide…” she whimpers, her words interrupted by shaky breaths.

“Sorry, sorry!” Draco apologizes quickly. “What’s your name, then?”

She mumbles something, but he can’t make it out, so he has her repeat it. And repeat it. Finally, after five repetitions and the beginning of a fierce headache, he eventually works out that she’s saying “Wachel.” Which he presumes is supposed to mean ‘Rachel,’ and if it doesn’t, then too bad.

At this point his knees are starting to hurt from sitting hunched over for so long, so he sits on the floor with a groan. “All right, Rachel. I’m Auror Malfoy. This house is called Dragon’s Nest. Did you call here through the Floo while you were playing?”

She shakes her head wordlessly. He waits for her to explain, but she doesn’t, so he sighs and continues. “All right, then, I’m going to take you home now.”

Unexpectedly, her sniffles stop and she scrunches up her nose. “Do I _have_ to go home?”

Draco sighs. There’s that obstinacy he’s come to expect when interacting with children. “Of course you have to go home. You weren’t planning on staying _here_ , were you?”

The girl shakes her head. “No! I was going to the park.” Miraculously, all traces of her tears of gone, and she’s adopted a very matter-of-fact expression.

The park? He supposes there’s probably one with a Floo around here. But does that mean her grandmother will be waiting for her at the park instead? “Did your grandmother go before you in the Floo, or did you go first?”

She tilts her head. “Grammy’s taking a nap. She lets me go to the park all by myself,” she says, obviously placing a lot of importance on her own independence.

But that’s a bit odd, isn’t it? She seems too young to be going places by herself—four or five at the most, if he’s at all accurate in his ability to judge age. He sighs. He’ll have a talk with the grandmother later, but for now, Draco is going to take her home.

“Well, you can go to the park later. We’ll have to talk to your grandmother first.”

“Aww… But I wanna go to the park!” And suddenly her lip is trembling, and she seems as if she’s about to cry again.

Draco needs something, anything, to say to keep the kid from crying again, and so he says, “How about I show you around my office?” And that’s all right, he needs to find the girl’s Apparition point anyway. (He could probably ask her for her Floo address, but the amount of trust he places in the Floo right now is steadily shrinking to zero.)

She perks up immediately (of course. _Children.)_ Draco stands and dons his Auror robes for the second time that day, turning toward the front door.

But then he pauses. Wasn’t there something about not Side-Alonging children except in emergencies? He let out an annoyed sigh. If he couldn’t use the Floo, he was going to have to drive, and he _hated_ driving.

He spares a brief thought to blocking the fireplace but thinks better of it; if Father calls and the Floo’s blocked, there’ll be a hell to pay that he can’t quite afford this week. He’s stressed enough as it is with Potter and work and the child in his house.

He turns toward Rachel, holding out his hand. “Have you ever ridden in a car before?”

-X-

“I don’t think I like riding in cars very much.” Rachel frowns as Draco leads her along the Ministry corridor. Good, at least the kid has a proper head on her shoulders. Anyone who likes cars is bound to be trouble.

“And I don’t like driving them,” he murmurs, narrowly dodging a couple of paper airplane memos that whiz by his head.

“Then why do you have one? Grammy doesn’t.” She looks at him inquisitively.

“Because sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do in order to get what you really want. In this case, my job.” He shrugs.

She nods as if she’s satisfied. “Okay.”

This gives him pause. How much do children understand about how the world works, anyway? He knows he would have pried, pestered whichever adult he was talking to for a less vague answer. But she seems content.

He tries to think of when he was young, but most of what he remembers involves either elaborate presents or being punished for not being the perfect young pureblood. He doesn’t think he’d truly known anything until he’d been long past his youth.

Whatever. She’s probably just naïve.

“How old are you, anyway?” he asks.

“I’m five!” she grins, and promptly holds up four fingers. She looks down at them for a moment, puzzled, then sticks her thumb up as well. “See? Five!”

He turns a quick corner, moving out of the way of a man in emerald robes—oh, fuck, really? He’s not in the mood for an encounter with Potter right now, but Potter’s already stopped in his tracks and turned around.

“Malfoy—“ Potter starts, but then stops, looking surprised. “I didn’t know you had a daughter.”

“What? Oh.” Draco shakes his head. “She’s not—I just met her. I’m taking her home.”

Rachel beams up at Potter— _so_ not fair, it was all tears and zero smiles when she’d met Draco—and lets go of Draco’s hand. “He’s not my papa,” she confirms. “I know you. You’re famous.”

“Er, yeah, I guess,” Potter says sheepishly, unfazed by the change of topics. He kneels down and asks her name, and five minutes later Draco wants to roll his eyes because now the two are chatting like they’ve known each other for years.

“Potter,” Draco prompts. He’d wanted to make this a quick trip, but Potter’s thoroughly reducing the likelihood of that.

“And that’s how my best friend ended up with a dragon tattoo on his back,” Potter finishes his sentence, Rachel giggles madly, and Draco feels his frustration grow (while simultaneously not-thinking about how attractive Potter looks with a grin on his face). “Oh, Malfoy. Am I keeping you?”

“A bit,” Draco mutters, and Potter’s grin fades.

“Sorry about that." Se stands. “I meant to ask you in the first place—would you spare a few minutes to answer some questions about last night?”

Draco’s pulse quickens ( _firewhisky Potter in his lap want want want_ ). “Last night?”

“Yeah, about the Floo.”

“Right.” Draco’s mind snaps back to reality. Potter’s not showing any interest in Draco at all. Last night was probably a fluke. There’s no reason he’d be bringing it up now, no reason he’d know just how much Draco had wanted him… And Potter _had_ mentioned that knowing about the Floo was his job last night. Come to think of it, Draco had heard whispers several years back about Potter being instated as the new Floo Network overseer, so it made perfect sense that he’d need to take a statement from Draco. Nothing more.

“It’ll only be a bit?”

Draco glances down at Rachel. “I have to take her home.”

“I’ll come!” Rachel interjects, expression hopeful, but Draco’s already shaking his head.

“It won’t be interesting. It’s official, so you’d likely have to wait outside.” Draco glances at Potter, and Potter nods in affirmation. “It’s much better just to take you home.”

Rachel pouts. “But I wanna come…”

Draco sighs. He’s really not in the mood for another one of the girl’s tantrums. It _would_ be faster—Potter’s office is on the way to his own from here, and his headache is only getting worse. “Fine. As long as it’s quick.”

“Don’t worry, it will be.” Potter smiles again, and Rachel cheers.

-X-

After pushing a chair out into the hallway for Rachel (and casting a one-way window on the door to keep an eye on her), Draco settles down into an armchair that is just a little too squishy and watches Potter as he bustles around and gathers the relevant paperwork. Potter’s office is modest, much like Draco’s own, except that Draco shares his office with Finnigan and also doesn’t have the enormous fireplace that takes up the entirety of one of Potter’s walls. There’s Floo powder all over the hearth, and Draco thinks he spies scorch marks on the edge of Potter’s desk (he’s not going to ask.)

“Ah, found it.” Potter snatches a form out of his desk and pushes the drawer closed with a bang. “Sometimes I’m afraid to _Accio_ paperwork. If I get the form title wrong, every piece of parchment in my office flies at me." He chuckles.

Draco is caught by the way Potter’s eyes crinkle at the edges. Something must be wrong with him, because he’s not tipsy at all anymore and Potter’s still making his heart beat fast. “Sounds like a bastard to fix,” he murmurs, and Potter’s _looking_ at him again. Shit.

“To be honest, I still haven’t set it straight.” Potter laughs, and his expression is so open that Draco has to look away.

He glances at Rachel through the window. She’s turning her head to watch people as they pass, her small legs kicking in a chair that’s much too tall for her. “You mentioned that this would be quick?”

Potter sits down across from him, scribbling his name and date onto a parchment. Draco stares longingly at Potter’s state-of-the-art triplicate quill, one that automatically copies forms in threefold so that one doesn’t have to do it themselves—Draco’s meant to buy one for a long time, but he keeps forgetting. The quill is long and elegant, but Potter somewhat ruins the effect by somehow managing to get ink on his cheekbone. “It will be quick, unless you noticed anything out of the ordinary when the incident happened?” Potter looks back at him.

Out of the ordinary other than Potter suddenly being very heavy and warm in his lap? “No, not really.”

“All right. Describe what you did notice, then,” Potter continues scribbling.

“Well, I was reading. I had a bit of firewhisky beforehand, so I wasn’t as observant as I normally am, I’d say. I didn’t notice the Floo had opened until you were already… invading my space.” He tries his best to sound bored, unamused, but Potter’s sleeve has ridden up and the muscles in his forearm flex deliciously as he writes. Draco swallows. It’s enough to make him want to go to the club and try and pull tonight, despite the fact that it’s a Thursday and he hasn’t gone clubbing in ages.

“That seems a bit odd though, don’t you think?” Potter puts his chin in the palm of his quill hand, and it’s no wonder he’s got ink on his face if he sits like that all the time.

“What does?”

“That you didn’t notice anything at all. Even if you were completely smashed, and you didn’t seem like it, you were sitting right in front of the fire. You would have noticed if the flames had gone green for a bit, wouldn’t you?”

Draco wracks his brain, trying to remember the moments before his lapful of Potter. It’s not hard—he’d spent all last night reliving it, anyhow. “I didn’t see anything until you were already there,” he repeats.

Potter frowns a bit. “That’s… interesting.” Wonderful, now Potter thinks him an absentminded idiot.

“I really am more observant most of the time,” he says in his own defense.

“I know you are. Hermione’s an Auror, I know what she went through in training. You never would have made it if you were inherently unobservant.”

“I should think not.” Draco tries not to read too far into the indirect compliment, but his subconscious is preening.

Potter sets his quill down and leans back in his chair, staring at his fireplace. “What I’m interested in is the color change. If there’s a fire lit, it always flashes green when someone Floos in, unless it’s just a fire call. So either this was an exception, and you really didn’t see the color change…”

“…Or the color didn’t actually change at all?” Draco finishes for him, and Potter nods.

“Exactly.”

“Would that be important?” Draco leans forward, turning to stare at the fireplace. It’s not lit, which is just as well because the room would probably be hot as a furnace with a hearth of that size.

“Truthfully? I’m not sure.” Potter gets up, striding over to a worn-down bookshelf that’s nestled in the corner and pulling out a heavy tome. He flips through it quickly until he reaches a dog-eared page. (Draco winces. He was always taught that books were to be respected, not maimed.) “Besides the initial research done when Floo powder was invented, there hasn’t been a lot of real Ministry investigation on why the Floo works as it does. They never did anything more than the standard safety protocols, and it passed with flying colors.” He comes around the desk and sets the book down so that Draco can see its miniscule text, pointing to a badly-done wizarding portrait of an elderly woman. “Ignatia Wildsmith. Lived in the 13th century. No one knows much about her, although rumor has it she was a bit barmy.”

“Barmy as in mad, or barmy as in Luna Lovegood?”

“Luna’s not barmy.” Potter frowns at him slightly. “She just sees the world differently than we do.”

“Right.” Though he has no problems with the girl, there’s no disputing that she’s a little odd.

Potter sighs, but continues. “I guess Wildsmith could be considered similar, except that her passion was inventing things. Like Floo powder.”

“I never knew that,” Draco says. “We were always told as children that Floo-Pow was the only British Floo company there was, but that’s all I know.”

“That’s about all most people know. Which is where I come in.” Potter shuts his book, striding back over to the bookshelf to put it away, and Draco notices that Potter’s taken off his robes (a realization that has nothing to do with how nice his arse looks when he’s leaning over to shelve the book, no, never.)

“What exactly do you do, anyway?” Draco needs to clear his head, and what better way than to think about work instead? He’d known that Potter was the Floo Network Overseer, but knowing his position and knowing what that position entails are two completely separate things.

“I grant Floo access, mostly. That’s my official job description. But Kingsley asked me to do a bit of research on the side, so that’s what I do when I have free time at work. I gather reports from independent Floo studies and put it all together. You know, I used to hate research.” he shrugs with a wry smile. “But Hermione finally trained it into me, I suppose, and now I find it… relaxing.”

Draco realizes he has an odd smile on his face from watching Potter talk about something he obviously enjoys, and before he can wipe it away, Potter sees him and grins back. And then Draco swallows nervously because Potter’s walking toward him, tall and broad, and he’s licking his lips like he might want to kiss him—

“What’s this child doing outside your office, Harry?”

Both Draco and Potter jump as Minister Shacklebolt opens the door. Thankfully, they hadn’t been close enough (yet) as to be inappropriate, but still.

Draco stands and nods to Shacklebolt. He’s a respectable Minister, at least in Draco’s opinion, especially because he takes the time to speak to each and every Auror trainee when they receive their certification. Everyone knows that it’s important to have the Auror force be as loyal to the Minister as possible, so it’s an honorable play on Shacklebolt’s part. Besides, Shacklebolt had shown confidence in Draco’s Auror abilities at a time when almost no one else had, and for that, Draco feels fond of him.

“Oh, good day, Auror Malfoy. I didn’t know you had a daughter,” continues Shacklebolt. He motions at Rachel, who is currently peeking her head around the doorframe.

“She’s not—“ Potter starts, just as Draco is saying “It’s for a case—“

They both stop speaking awkwardly, and Draco clears his throat. “She got lost, and her residence is on file under a recent case of mine. I was just taking her home when Potter stopped me for a brief statement on a Floo malfunction, and she sort of… wheedled me into letting her stay.” He sighs.

Shacklebolt guffaws. “Ah, kids. I understand. Were you almost finished with Auror Potter?”

“I believe so?” Draco turns to Potter with the question in his eyes.

 “Yes, we were just about done.” Potter nods, and it may just be Draco but Potter’s words sound just a tad regretful.

Draco holds up a hand in farewell, ready to take his leave, but Shacklebolt stops him just as he meets Rachel at the door.

“Auror Malfoy, did you say you were here for a Floo malfunction?”

“Yes, I was.” Draco turns around, just barely registering that Rachel’s slipped her hand into his.

“Would it happen to have something to do with a misdirection of the system?” Before Shacklebolt’s even done speaking, Draco feels an odd sense of worry in the back of his mind. He’s used to following his hunches—sometimes as an Auror, a hunch is as good as a definite clue—but before he can analyze the feeling, Potter speaks.

“That’s exactly it. Is that what you were here to talk about, Kingsley?”

Draco is a little in awe of Potter for using Shacklebolt’s given name instead of his title, but the Minister seems unfazed and simply nods. “Yes, it is. I don’t know if you’ve spoken with the Auror secretary recently.” He turns to Draco, “but he’s been getting quite a few calls in the last twenty-four hours about similar such situations.

No, Draco hasn’t talked to Grignard lately (because Grignard is usually grouchy and just a bit lewd), but he’s got enough firsthand experience with the situation to groan at Shacklebolt’s statement. “I haven’t spoken to him, no. But the Floo sent Potter to my residence last night, and it sent Rachel there when I got home from work today.” He tilts his head toward the girl.

Shacklebolt and Potter look surprised, but Rachel grins, seemingly glad just to be included. “I was gonna go to the park. But I went to Mister Malfoy’s instead!” (She seems to have trouble with ‘L’s, because the L in his name is nonexistent.)

“Really? You didn’t tell me that Rachel was misdirected,” Potter says, his eyebrows raised.

“It’s not Auror policy to involve children unnecessarily.” Draco shrugs. “So I figured you were under similar constraints.” In reality, he’d just forgotten to mention it, but Potter doesn’t need to know that.

“Of course.” Potter nods. “It’s just very interesting, that it would happen twice to you specifically.”

The room is silent for a moment while Potter’s statement is puzzled over.

Shacklebolt sighs. “I was here to brief you on the situation, Harry, but it appears you’ve already been briefed.” He eyes Rachel, but seems to decide that it won’t harm anything to have her overhear the conversation. “Whatever the problem is, it’d make it a lot easier on both Grignard and myself if you’d have it figured out within the week. Floo misdirections are no laughing matter.”

“Of course, Kingsley.” Potter nods solemnly. “I’ll take a look immediately.”

“Excellent. I’ll see to it that any relevant information is passed your way. Merlin knows it’s beyond Secretary Grignard’s job, and it’s not the kind of situation where Aurors can be dispatched and have it solved immediately. Although…” He swings around to look at Draco. “Are you on a case right now, Auror Malfoy?”

Draco shakes his head, feeling a sense of dull annoyance. This is by far not the most exciting case he could be assigned, but… at least Potter will be there. Not that he cares, or anything.

“Consider yourself on-assignment, then. If anything nasty happens with the interpersonal side of things, I’m confident you can handle it.”

“Yes, Minister.”

Shacklebolt offers a smile, reaching down to pat Rachel on the head before slipping out the door. His long, traditional Minister’s robes swish behind him as he leaves.

“I suppose we’re in this together, then?” Draco turns to Potter.

But Potter has an odd look on his face, now. “I s’pose we are… Anyhow, my shift’s about to end. And you have to get Rachel home, right?”

“What? Yes, but…” Draco starts, expecting Potter to say _something_ acknowledging their previous closeness, but Potter only blinks at him.

That’s odd of Potter. He’d seemed receptive enough before to the possibility of something more with Draco, but he’s suddenly distant. Had Draco said something odd when the Minister was in?

Well, no matter. If Potter’s gotten into a bad mood, Draco’s not going to concern himself with the man. (He’ll admit that his ego is a little sore, though. Teasing wanker.)

He glances down at Rachel, who’s currently pouting, and turns toward the door. “Come along, then. Your grandmother might be awake.”

She sighs, but comes with him. “Bye, Harry!” she smiles over her shoulder. Draco snorts, both because it sounds more like ‘Hawwy’ than anything and because Potter being on a first name basis with a five-year-old just seems like something to snort at.

He does glance back at Potter as he leaves the room, but Potter simply looks tired. There's no longing or lust in his face, despite what Draco might imagine in fantasy.

He sighs. Much has he hates to admit it, he does want Potter, and it’s troubling that Potter had changed his mind so suddenly. But there could have been other causes for such a mood change, so Draco decides not to feel too annoyed about it.

Heading to the Auror offices with Rachel’s hand in his, he thinks about Potter grinning and has to smile.

-X-

“Hello?” An elderly witch’s voice comes through the wards, just after Draco knocks on the door.

“Hello, Madame. I’m Auror Malfoy, and your granddaughter got lost. I was just bringing her home.”

“Oh, goodness! I’ll be right there,” she replies, and the wards go silent while Draco and Rachel wait for the door to be opened.

“You feeling all right?” Draco asks Rachel in the meantime. It turns out that she gets just a bit of carsickness, and that giving her a biscuit from his office may have not been the smartest idea. Thankfully, she didn’t vomit, but it had been a close call.

“Mhm. I don’t like cars,” she reiterates, just as she’d been saying for the last half hour, and Draco feels for her because he’s known carsickness as well. It’s odd, seeing as he’s perfectly fine on both broomsticks and the Hogwarts Express, but something about cars does bloody awful things to his stomach.

He squeezes her hand, and the door opens.

“Auror Malfoy?” Rachel’s grandmother speaks, and Draco nods. She’s a very tiny lady, barely four feet, and she’s wearing a particularly bright pink floppy hat along with a set of casual black robes in a style that he’s only ever seen on witches over a hundred years of age.

“Yes, Madame. We met when you misplaced your glasses a few weeks ago, if you’ll recall?”

“My glasses? Oh, no, they’re right here on my face, see?” She pulls them away from her eyes for a moment.

Draco can, in fact, see, and he says as much, but he wonders at her forgetfulness.

Regardless, he follows the witch (Mrs. Anderson, her file had said) into the house and accepts her offer for a quick cup of tea.

“Adelaide, why don’t you run along and play, now?” The woman motions toward a set of stairs.

Huh. Draco had _thought_ the girl’s name was Adelaide. He glances at the girl in confusion, but Rachel isn’t looking at him at the moment. “Yes, Grammy. Bye, Mister Malfoy!” she acquiesces peacefully and skips up the stairs. Typical child, not a care in the world.

Draco follows the elderly witch towards the sitting room of the small house, sitting on a squeaky couch and trying not to notice the overwhelming scent of cleaning charms.

“Do I have to give a statement, Auror?” Mrs. Anderson asks, waving a small tea set over with a slightly trembling wand hand. Draco takes a proffered cup, sipping quietly before answering.

“Yes, if you don’t mind.” He pulls a form from his robes. Cursing his lack of a triplicate quill (he’ll have to copy this twice at the office later), he begins a quick round of interrogation.

“Did you notice when your granddaughter went missing?”

“I’m afraid I didn’t. I was napping, you see.” She looks apologetic. “How did she get lost?”

Draco pauses in his writing to acknowledge the question. “She took the Floo, meaning to reach Meadow Pointe Park.” He’d found the name of the only park in England with a Floo connection when he was at the office, wondering if the address was in any way similar to Dragon’s Nest. It wasn’t. “Instead, through a Floo difficulty that was no fault of her own, she ended up in my residence.”

“Oh dear, I’m sorry to trouble you, Auror!” The elderly witch sets down her teacup with a clink.

“It’s not a bother, Madame.” Much. “She’s been very well behaved, I assure you.” Mostly.

“Oh, then that’s wonderful to hear, Auror. I just assumed she had gone to the park,” Mrs. Anderson explains, adjusting her robes around herself.

As much as he hates criticizing parenting techniques, it sometimes comes as part of his job, and he can do nothing but try to be as subtle as possible. “That’s fine, Mrs. Anderson. But isn’t the park a bit far away for a five year old to be travelling on her own?”

“Well… yes, I suppose so.” She sighs. “But she enjoys it so, and the Floo is hard on these old bones.” It’s a perfectly good reason, and it’s not illegal, per se. But still.

“I understand.” Draco nods. Time to make excuses. “However, you see, we’ve been having some Floo problems recently. I’d really appreciate it if she was kept away from the Network for a while. I wouldn’t want her to get hurt,” he says sincerely.

“Yes, of course.” Mrs. Anderson nods quickly.

Good. There’s no need to ever tell Mrs. Anderson when the Floos are safe again, of course, so hopefully Rachel will be kept away from the Floo until she’s old enough to travel unaccompanied. Even so, he can't help but feel a pang of worry when he thinks of Mrs. Anderson's apparent forgetfulness.

“I just have a few more questions for you,” Draco says, unrolling another foot worth of his paperwork. Upstairs, he hears a high-pitched imitation of a dragon’s roar.

-X-

There are some good things about working with Potter. For one, Head Auror Robards has given Draco permission to come in an hour later, since he’s working exclusively on Potter’s case and Potter doesn’t get in until eight. He’s been relishing the chance to sleep in, as it’s a pleasure he hasn’t been allowed since his last vacation. Potter’s office is also mercifully quiet. The walls are thicker, and the surrounding offices aren't nearly as noisy as the Auror department.

And then there are things that are not so grand, like the fact that they’ve found no leads on their case whatsoever. More and more misdirection calls keep popping up, and Draco’s already had to help a few wizards return to their homes. They haven’t outright lost anyone yet, but that’s not much of a consolation. Worse, the Prophet’s caught on, and they’ve begun harassing anyone they can reach for statements (though oddly enough, they’ve been avoiding Potter). It’s only a matter of time before they realize that Draco’s the Auror on assignment, and he’s not looking forward to it at all.

But the most infuriating thing about working with Potter is Potter himself, because Potter has seemingly ceased to find Draco attractive at all, and Draco has no idea why. It’s not as if he’s done anything outright unsavory (at least, he hopes not.)

Draco’s pride is one of his (few) faults; the incessant impulse to always get what he wants is another. (And he does want Potter, as much as his younger self would cringe to think of it.) Both of those faults are his destruction when Potter is concerned, because Potter has damaged his pride and elicited unrequited want all at once. He watches Potter, studies him, trying fruitlessly to find out what makes the man seem so attractive so that he can disarm the notion and return himself to normal. But try as he might, there’s no certain quality that separates Potter from the rest of the men out there.

Potter reads and takes statements and smears ink on his face during their strategy sessions. Potter makes the wanting hit Draco at the oddest moments, leaving him unsteady even when Potter’s just asking him if he wants a cuppa. It somehow goes beyond physical attraction, which is unheard of for Draco lately, not after five years of declaring himself as officially over the dating scene. Too much hassle, not enough reward, in his opinion. But then Potter came along, and isn’t that cliché, the whole ‘old school nemesis becomes love interest’ phenomena? But it’s happened. Not the love part, but a whole lot of lust and maybe a smidge of genuine attraction. And there’s nothing that Draco can do about it.

Except make it worse, of course.

With no avenue to escape, Draco faces it full on, trying his best to make it obvious to Potter that yes, he’s entirely receptive to whatever will get him into Potter’s bed. However, Potter seems to be having none of it. While they’re searching through files and trying to find connections between the malfunction Floo locations, Draco sits just a little too close to Potter and intentionally rests his knee against the brunet’s. Potter simply shifts away as he goes to grab more files. When they’re discussing the mechanics of misdirections, he stares into Potter’s eyes and licks his lips. Potter seems visibly affected, but he looks away before Draco can try to lean closer.

He’s even considered just asking Potter out. The idea is entirely un-Slytherin of him, but he wants Potter enough that he may have to resort to it. Potter invades his thoughts, just as he invaded his home. As much as he tries to focus on the case, it’s becoming increasingly blurry. Potter is all he can think about.

But he is forced to return to reality when he comes home after work a week later and finds a little girl sitting in front of his fireplace.

“What—Rachel? Did you misdirect again?” he asks, striding over to her. She’s brought the model dragon with her today and is thankfully not crying.

“Uh-uh.” She shakes her head. “I meant to come here. Grammy said I could!”

Draco puts a hand to his forehead, closing his eyes and sighing. “And why, pray tell, did you want to come here?” Beyond that, his warning to Rachel’s grandmother hadn’t worked. And of course Rachel had actually remembered his Floo address from when he’d briefly mentioned it earlier. Bollocks.

“’Cause it’s fun,” she says. “Grammy won’t let me go to the park anymore, but she said it was okay since you’re an Auror!” ‘Auror’ comes out sounding like one long ‘R’, and Draco almost snorts.

“Even if it’s fun, you can’t just come over here,” he scolds her.

“Oh… Why not?” she pouts.

“Because… it’s my house. It’s private.” Draco sits down on the couch with a muffled thump.

“But I thought we were friends?” Oh Merlin, she looks like she’s getting ready to cry, and Draco wants to pull his hair out.

He settles for redirecting the question. “Sure, whatever.” He stands up again. “Look, why don’t we go see Potter?” They don’t have any leads on their case, and as long as Rachel’s here, they can probably get her to answer a few questions.

Rachel frowns.

“What? I thought you liked Mr. Potter?”

“I don’t like the car,” she whispers. Oh. Right. Draco considers the dilemma. It would probably be easier to have Potter come here, which doubles as an excuse to interact with Potter in a non-work setting (and possibly tempt him into something more with Draco—after Rachel’s gone, of course.) It doesn’t take long for Draco to convince himself that it’s the most convenient choice.

“How about I invite him over here instead? And then we can have tea, and afterwards I’ll take you back to your grandmother. All right?”

“Okay.” Rachel smiles.

Draco scrawls a quick owl to Potter, sending it off with his owl (she hoots at him self-importantly) and shedding his Auror robes in the process. “Is Adelaide your real name?” he asks Rachel. He’d been wondering about it, since he’s heard her grandmother use the name twice now.

“No.” She shakes her head. “It’s my mum’s name.”

“Huh. Why does your grandmother call you that, then?”

Rachel shrugs. "She forgets. I reminded her lots of times, but she still calls me Adelaide." She pouts a bit.

Mrs. Anderson’s more forgetful than he’d previously thought, then. And with that realization comes a sinking feeling in his chest. He’s seen this sort of situation before. Elderly witches and wizards don’t show signs of aging nearly as fast as Muggles do, but it does happen eventually. Forgetfulness, paranoia, confusion—all three have been the subjects of various cases that Draco’s had to deal with. Normally, it’s no more troubling than the average drunk-in-public call.

But none of those witches and wizards had been in direct care of a child. And as much as he hates to interfere with families, he has a sinking feeling that interference may be on the horizon.

“Does your grandmother often forget things, Rachel?”

Rachel nods slowly. “A lot. I wish she wouldn’t. And she can’t play dragons with me because it hurts her back.” She looks at him meaningfully. “Are you gonna play dragons with me?”

Fighting the urge to roll his eyes, Draco sighs. If he says no, she’ll be upset. If he says yes, he’ll be mildly embarrassed, but otherwise unscathed. That seems like the better path to take, so he says “All right. Why not?”

He settles himself onto the floor with Rachel, summoning the nearest thing he can find to use as a toy. It happens to be the book he’d been reading when Potter fell into his lap. Looking at it brings about an odd mix of feelings in his stomach, but he shakes them off before they can dig too deeply into his skin.

He’s using the book to “shelter” Rachel’s toy dragon from the rain when Potter Apparates in.

“How’d you Apparate in?” Draco sits up, frowning at Potter.

“I’m… not sure, actually.” Potter shrugs. “I didn’t really think about it. I didn’t feel the wards resisting, at any rate.”

Draco closes his eyes and mentally searches for breaks in the wards. There are none. “Does this have to do with the Floo malfunction?”

Potter thinks about it for a moment. “It might, actually. Remind me to bring that up later.” He frowns a bit, motioning toward Rachel as if to say, ‘Not while she’s here’.

At this point, Rachel gets up and runs to Potter, hugging him around the knees. “Hi, Harry!” she slurs the ‘R’s in his name, and this time Draco does snort. Potter makes a face at him, patting Rachel on the head.

“Do you mind if I ask you some questions about last time you came to Malfoy’s house?” Potter’s smile is soft and genuine, and Draco has to swallow back his impulse to make a comment, to say something to deflect the tremor in his chest. But there’s nothing to say, really. Draco wants Potter, and Potter doesn’t want him back.

Rachel is oblivious to Draco’s internal dilemma, of course. “Okay,” she says, sitting on the floor with her legs crossed.

“It won’t be too boring, I hope.” Potter sits across from her and conjures a quill and parchment. “Did you see anything odd when you used the Floo that time?”

Rachel thinks about it. “Er… No.” She shakes her head.

“Are you sure? Nothing strange at all?”

“N… actually, yes! The pathway was orange that time.” She beams at having remembered. Draco raises his eyes at Potter over her head—apparently he’d been right about the color. He makes a mental note to trust his own judgement more often.

“Are you sure?” Potter asks, pausing his messy quill strokes. Rachel nods emphatically, and he continues to mark it down.

“Do you wanna play dragons with me and Mister Malfoy?” Rachel changes the subject.

“Soon,” Potter promises. “One last thing. Did it feel funny at all?”

“I don’t think so.” Rachel bites her lip for a moment, then shakes her head. “Can we play now?”

“Sure,” Potter says, putting away his quill.

“But only for a little while.” Draco puts his foot down. “Then you have to go home, Rachel.”

“Aww… okay.” Rachel huffs a dramatic sigh, but picks up her dragon nonetheless.

-X-

This time, when Draco takes Rachel home (after a full workday’s worth of effort put into convincing her to get in the car again), he addresses both her and her grandmother more sternly.

“I thought she’d be safe if she went to visit you.” Mrs. Anderson wrings her hands.

“It’s not the place that’s unsafe, Madame. It’s the Floo itself.” He crouches down next to Rachel. “Listen, all right? The Floo isn’t working correctly right now. Remember when you got lost the first time?”

Rachel nods. “Mhmm.”

“And wasn’t it scary?”

“I wasn’t scared!” Rachel denies it, and Draco sighs.

“Even if you weren’t scared, do you want to get lost again?”

“No…” she admits.

“So will you wait to use the Floo until it’s safe? I’ll owl your grandmother and let her know,” Draco promises. And he will. He’s starting to feel partially responsible for the little girl, even though it wasn’t his intention to get involved at all.

“Okay…” Rachel hangs her head.

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

“Good girl.” Draco offers her a smile before standing back up. “Please let me know if you have any questions, Mrs. Anderson. And I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t let her use the Floo any longer.”

“Of course, Auror.”

He waves goodbye, hoping that this time, her grandmother will have some sense.

Even after Draco drives home, Rachel weighs heavily on his mind. He knows it’s only because he’s getting attached to her that he wonders if she’s getting adequate care, but the idea keeps niggling him until he finally Apparates to the office and does some research.

Two hours and a cup of strong tea later, he’s found as much as he can on the little family, and his heart hurts for the little girl. Her father is unknown. Her mother was a potions addict until she died of related complications two years ago. Rachel’s lived with her grandmother ever since, but both her grandmother and her mother had children late in their lifetimes. Her grandmother is over a hundred.

He can’t get access to any of the medical documents without official reason, so he’s forced to stop investigating. It’s aggravating.

“You’re in late, Auror Malfoy.” Granger pokes her head in, and Draco jumps. He throws a quick _Tempus_ into the air. She’s right, it’s past ten o’clock.

“Same to you, Auror Granger,” he points out. Granger’s not too bad nowadays; she’s much quieter than Draco’s partner, and she’s extremely quick of wit. It’s refreshing to work with her now and then.

“Touché.” She smiles wryly, and is about to leave when Draco stops her.

“You work with child services on occasion, do you not?”

She sticks her head back in the doorway. “Yes. Why?”

“How do they go about dealing with possibly unfit caretakers?” Even uttering the words makes him feel guilty. He’s not going to act until he’s positive that Rachel’s not safe with her grandmother, but it’s something he should probably look into nonetheless.

Granger purses her lips. “Mind if I sit down?” Draco nods toward his partner’s desk, and she sits primly. “I’ll be honest, Malfoy. Wizarding Child Services in this Ministry are a load of tripe.”

“How so?”

“They do nearly nothing. There’ve been quite a few cases where I’ve had to fight them about having a child removed from custody. It’s only when caretakers are blatantly abusive that I’ve been able to succeed.”

Draco’s heart sinks. “So there’s no chance of, say, a child being removed from a grandmother who can’t even remember the kid’s name?”

Granger shakes her head. “I wish there was a way. But that’s nowhere near enough grounds to change the child’s living situation. It’s really stupid, honestly.”

Draco has to agree with her. He grits his teeth. It seems he can’t really do anything for Rachel after all. He mulls it over in silence for a moment.

“I thought you were working with Harry?” Granger asks after a minute.

“Hmm? I am.” Draco looks back up.

“So how did a child get involved?” Granger’s eyebrows raise.

Draco snorts. “She was misdirected into my house.”

“Ah, I see.” Granger nods.

There’s another awkward silence while it seems as if she’s preparing to say something.

“Whatever it is, spit it out.” Draco sighs.

“Oh! Well… How is working with Harry, anyway?” It seems as if she’s suggesting something, but even then, he has no idea what she’s trying to get at.

“It’s fine,” Draco says, even though ‘fine’ is an understatement in several different ways.

“Harry’s been acting oddly lately, is all.” Granger shrugs.

Granger may not be bad, but that doesn’t mean that Draco wants to spill his heart to her. Nonetheless, something in her expression makes him open his mouth anyway. “Potter is infuriatingly hard to get.”

She blinks at him for a few seconds before realization strikes. “Ha! No wonder he’s been acting funny.” She grins.

“What? Why?” Draco crosses his arms.

“For one, he’s awful at romance. Completely terrible. For another, he refuses to date coworkers.”

“Why not?”

Granger’s grin fades. “Well… he used to have a partner, you see.”

Her tone sounds ominous, and Draco’s eyes widen. “They died?”

“No! Nothing like that." Granger waves away the suggestion. “They did quit, though, and dropped Harry at the same time. It was very sudden. Harry was broken up over it for a long while. That’s when he switched to Floo Network Admin, you know.” Draco wonders at her openness. She does seem a little guilty about sharing Harry’s secrets, yet she’s doing so anyway. Such a Gryffindor trait.

“Just a breakup then? Seems like a silly reason to swear off coworkers entirely,” Draco points out.

“It is a bit silly,” Granger admits. “But also… sad.” She shifts, crossing her legs. “You see, Harry’s got this flaw where he feels like he has to be the one to protect everyone. Leftovers from the war, you know. And he was just a little too overprotective at just the wrong time, and he got hurt because of it.”

The war. A fragment of the past that will always have meaning to their generation. All of them have those lingering aspects of themselves that the war forever changed, even though the past is far behind them. Ripples are still spreading from when the tides had washed their childhood away so long ago, and there’s nothing to do but try and get around them.

“What did Potter do before the Floo?” Draco wonders.

Granger smiles. “He was an Obliviator, same department as Ron. He used to love it. But then his boyfriend left and blamed him for a whole lot of shite, some of which wasn’t even accurate. Harry’s the type of person that can take anything in stride unless it’s from someone he loves, and that’s exactly what happened.”

Draco sighs. Emotional baggage. It seems that Potter has it worse than most people do. What surprises Draco is that it doesn’t change anything for him. He still wants Potter, despite the amount of work that it looks like it’s going to take.

He swallows. “He’s not bad, Potter.”

Granger chuckles. “No, he’s not.” She stretches and stands. “I’ve told you enough of his secrets for the night, I think. If you’re serious about him, I think you’ll find a way to get closer. He’s always been funny about you.”

Draco wants to ask what that means, but she’s gone before he can speak.

-X-

“I’ve been doing research on the flame color,” Potter says when Draco walks in the next morning. It’s a dreary Friday, and Draco already wants to leave, but a new lead is just tantalizing enough for him to tolerate staying (for now).

“And?” Draco asks.

“It looks like the green is caused entirely by the Floo powder. It’s as I suspected. Usually, the powder powers the whole Floo journey from start to finish. But since the flames were colored normally at the end of both Rachel and I’s misdirections, it makes me wonder if somehow the Floo powder was disengaged somehow.”

“It’s an interesting thought.” Draco settles down into the now familiar too-squishy chair. “But how would that work, anyway?”

“That’s the thing,” Potter starts. He suddenly looks uncomfortable. “There’s no way it could happen by itself. There would have to be something controlling it.”

Draco sits up. “That doesn’t sound good.”

“No, it’s not good at all,” Harry says with a frown. “Floo powder is the only way humans have ever been able to harness the Floo Network.”

Draco leans forward, feeling on edge. “You say humans, specifically. Does that mean there’s something else harnessing it?”

“Yes. In a way.” Potter sighs. “I was hoping we wouldn’t have to dig this deep, but… have you ever heard of the Mother Hearth?”

Draco shakes his head.

“I didn’t think so.” Potter stands up and starts to pace. “Treat this as confidential, if you will. Basically, it’s the heart of the Floo network for most of Eastern Europe. And that’s about as much as humans ever knew about it, before me.”

“So this is what your research has been on?”

“Exactly.” Potter spares him a small smile before continuing. “What I’ve learned is that there’s some sort of energy source located there. I’m not sure what it is, but it’s immensely powerful, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned in my lifetime, it’s that having too much power concentrated in one place will always have a downside.”

“You can say that again.” Draco sighs. “Do you think something’s gone wrong with it?”

“That’s what I’m starting to suspect. I’ve got no proof, of course, but I’m going to keep looking into it. If someone figures out how to manipulate that, well… we’ve got a catastrophe on our hands.” Potter sits back down and starts thumbing through interviews again.

A catastrophe. The words are more than a little ominous, conjuring more than enough reason for them to close this case as fast as possible. Thinking of solving the case isn’t entirely pleasing though, because then he won’t see Potter every day, which is something he’s started looking forward to.

“Malfoy?”

“Hmm?” Draco looks up from where he’d been staring at the wall.

“You all right? You were spaced out for a bit.”

“I’m fine,” Draco says. Except he’s not truly fine, because now he’s looking into Potter’s eyes and the wanting strikes him again.

Potter averts his eyes. “Malfoy…”

“What?”

“Can you… can you not do that, please?”

Draco’s eyebrows scrunch together. “Do what? Space out?”

“No, not that. I meant the part about you looking at me like you’re trying to undress me with your eyes.” Potter’s mouth tightens, and so does Draco’s chest.

He tries to think of something to say, but he can’t.

“Look, I know what you’re trying to do,” Potter continues eventually. “You want to fuck, right? And then be done with it. But that’s not really what I’m looking for. I’m sorry.” He shrugs. And he truly does look sorry, but that doesn’t reduce the sudden and surprising ache in Draco’s throat.

“I’m not… I’d go on a date with you, if you wanted,” Draco tries, but Potter shakes his head.

“Malfoy… Draco. It’s not you. I think you’re attractive enough, and I know I said we’d go out for drinks and I’m terribly sorry for leading you on like that.”

Draco likes the sound of his own name on Potter’s lips, but it’s not nearly enough to mask his dismay. He sighs, crossing his arms around himself. He’s getting the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ excuse and they’re not even dating. “What is it that you have against it?”

“What, having a one-off?” Potter raises his eyebrows like he’s unimpressed, and Draco gives him a look.

“No.” He pauses, rolling the words around in his mouth to see how they feel. “Having a relationship. With me.” As soon as the words escape, Draco wants to take them back—they feel too real, too personal, but it’s something he wants all the same.

“You can’t want that.” Potter squints at him. “I’ve… paid attention. You haven’t dated anyone in a very long time.”

Draco’s pulse quickens. Potter’s been watching him, and if that’s the case then maybe he has a chance after all. “That doesn’t mean I’m opposed to it,” he points out.

Potter gives a long sigh. “Draco, you have to know that it would never work. There’s too much between us. We’re not even that grand at getting along now.”

Draco would like to disagree. This is the first argument they’ve had since Shacklebolt shoved them together. But he knows when he’s lost a fight, and as much as he craves Potter, he doesn’t want to beg. It’s unbecoming, and he doubts it would work.

He grips the edge of his chair so his legs won’t carry him away without his permission; fleeing is his specialty, in situations like this. “Whatever you say, Potter.”

Potter sighs with relief, and despite just being thoroughly denied in his advances, Draco still can’t quell the desire to kiss him.

-X-

The weekend is quiet, with no calls from work (or anyone else, for that matter). Normally, a quiet weekend for Draco is a blissful one, but this particular weekend is torturous. He has nothing to distract him from thinking about Potter.

So Draco relives the week, thinking about every time Potter’s eyes had brightened or his arms had flexed as he stretched. And in particular, he relives the moment when Potter had told Draco to stop trying to pursue him.

Granger had warned him about Potter, had told him that Potter wouldn’t be very receptive, but that hasn’t stopped the knot in his chest that seems to have lodged itself there for good. Potter is more intelligent than he thought, kinder and more resourceful than he’d imagined. It’s as if Draco’s intentions have started down a side road that he thought he’d blocked off forever. The path is winding and bumpy, yes, but it leads somewhere, and that somewhere is a place he passionately wants to see.

But when Draco gets to Potter’s office on Monday morning, he doesn’t have a chance to continue obsessing over Potter because Shacklebolt’s there again. And he has worse news than they could have imagined.

“This morning, at dawn, a child was lost.”

Draco’s heart jumps into his throat, and his mind whizzes to thoughts of Rachel. _Oh no oh no oh no—_ “Is she all right?” his mouth moves before he can tell it to.

Shacklebolt looks at him oddly. “It’s a ‘he’, actually. And the answer is that we don’t know, because he’s _lost._ ”

Right. Lost. Feelings of embarrassment drift over him and root themselves in his skin, and he ducks his head and sits down.

“I know you two have been researching nonstop, but if you could kindly find a solution soon, it would be very helpful.” Then, his face softens. “I don’t mean to be rude, men, but I really don’t want any more children getting lost under my regime.” And Draco understands; Shacklebolt has grandchildren.

“Got it, sir.” Potter nods. “I think we’re on the edge of figuring something out, but we need more time…” He looks about as dismayed as Draco feels.

A thought strikes at Draco, and he raises his head. “Minister?”

“Yes, Auror?”

“How do we know the child was lost completely? Maybe they just Floo’d somewhere else and are taking a while to find a way home?”

“Ah, yes. I apologize for not briefing you properly. We know he’s lost because he wasn’t trying to use the Floo at all.”

Potter looks shocked. “What? How?”

Shacklebolt shakes his head. “No one knows. The mother saw, but only out of the corner of her eye. There wasn’t even a fire lit in the hearth.”

Potter looks surprised into silence. Draco clears his throat, which has suddenly become very dry. “And we’re sure the family isn’t just… I don’t know, looking for attention?”

“Your partner is investigating that now, but as far as we know, it’s a genuine incident.” Shacklebolt puts an end to that trail immediately. “A terrible, terrible thing... If you two require any outside resources, please don’t hesitate to ask. This has been upgraded to a Level Two case in your department, Auror Malfoy, so we have several Aurors on standby to deal with any more misdirections. As of now, continue to help Harry with research, if you will.”

“Yes sir.” Draco nods.

He’s slightly shocked, because they haven’t had a Level Two case since three years ago, back when a mass murderer was wreaking havoc in the side alleys of Diagon. Even then, Draco wasn’t directly assigned to the case; he and Finnigan were simply backup, and he was glad for it. The Aurors on duty were on-call around the clock, sleep-deprived, and perpetually tense, not to mention paranoid.

It looks like it’s his turn.

-X-

And that’s how the Seizing begins. Of course, it’s not called that yet, because it’s too new for any of them to fathom. Draco and Potter lock themselves in Potter’s office and begin scouring old texts, looking for anything that might give them a clue as to how a child might be abducted through the fireplace.

For twenty-four hours after the child is taken, the air is clear—no misdirections at all. It’s as if whoever is orchestrating the Floo mishaps is testing the waters, because the next morning at dawn, it all goes to hell.

Draco and Potter are awoken from their transfigured beds (formerly chairs) by Finnigan bursting into the office. “We’re gonna need you two up in Auror Headquarters, stat,” he tells them urgently.

Draco sits up, instantly awake. “Finnigan? What’s going on?”

“It’s awful, mate. It’s happened again. Except not just once. Nine. Nine people were taken this morning, all at once—just, come on, we’ll brief you up there.” He shakes his head as the words fly from his mouth. Finnigan often talks faster than he can think, and it normally gets on Draco’s nerves, but now the urgency seems fitting.

“My God,” Potter mutters. “Could this get any worse?”

As it turns out, it certainly could get worse, because by the time they reach the Auror department a tenth victim is reported.

“Good, you’re here.” Head Auror Robards acknowledges them as they stride into the room. They join the group of gathered Aurors, several who look like they’ve just gotten out of bed. Draco can spy a backwards uniform in their midst. He would have laughed at another time, another day.

“All right,” Robards rumbles. “I’ll recap for your sakes. As Auror Finnigan’s no doubt told you by now, several more incidents occurred at six o’clock this morning. And it wasn’t just children this time—we have one from almost every age group from infancy to a hundred years of age, with the exception of the range consisting of thirties to forties.”

“Ah, sir?” Auror Bones speaks from the back.

“What is it, Bones?”

“We’ve just gotten a preliminary profile on the tenth victim. They were thirty-six.”

Robards sighs. “And there you have it; whoever is doing this is certainly methodical. It was exactly a fifty-fifty split between males and females. We have three who indirectly witnessed the incident; one watched their mother abducted in the washroom mirror. A few said they came in the room immediately after hearing unexpected silences. The rest of the cases were noticed after the fact, ranging from a few minutes to an hour.”

Draco is surprised to realize that he actually feels frightened. He’s normally impervious to most case subjects—having a madman in one’s house really does wonders in helping one to toughen up—but as far as he can tell, the incidents are perfectly random. He’s thankful his parents are in France, because the English Floo Network can’t reach them there.

“And that’s all we know. We have Auror Malfoy working with Overseer Potter on determining exactly how this is happening. Everyone who is currently unassigned, consider yourselves officially assigned to this case. You will be primarily interviewing families of the victims.” Robards pauses, and a few scattered ‘Yes sir!’s echo throughout the room before he continues. “Those who are already on assignment right now will be divided up according to levels. If the case is Level Five, put it on hold. If the level increases, please come see me. Level Fours can keep working on their respective cases, but consider yourself backup if we need it. And Level Threes…” He surveys the room. “If I remember correctly, there are only three pairs of you at this moment in time, yes?”

Several heads nod.

“All right. Continue to work exclusively on your own cases, with the exception of Auror Granger.”

“Yes, sir?” Granger raises her head from where she’d been diligently taking notes.

“You’re to leave the Bowman case to Auror Bones for now. Please assist Auror Malfoy and Overseer Potter with research.”

“On it, sir.” She smiles fiercely, and Draco feels slightly better. If there’s anyone who can research their way out of this, it’s Granger.

“That’s a wrap on the briefing, Aurors. We’re currently still at a Level Two, but only just barely. I’ll warn you ahead of time to be prepared for a Level One, though I hope it doesn’t come to that.” He motions at the Level meter on the wall. Murmuring erupts within the crowd, because the needle is quavering on the line between One and Two, and Level Ones are almost unheard of. They’re reserved for widespread catastrophes that affect everyone in the local wizarding world. They haven’t had a Level One since Voldemort. It’s not a good sign at all.

“Any questions?” Robards asks, rolling up his briefing parchments.

Auror McDonald raises her hand. “Protocol on dealing with the press, sir?”

Robards sighs. “Don’t give them anything, if possible. If we reach Level One, we’ll have to do an official press conference, but barring that, tell them ‘no comment’ and move on. Other questions?”

Somewhere behind him, Draco hears Potter mutter something like 'Thank  _Merlin_  Hermione got the press off of my back,' and Draco almost smiles.

“D’you want me with Malfoy, sir?” Finnigan asks, pointing to the Auror Code on the wall (Rule #3: Stay with one’s partner at all times unless instructed otherwise.)

Robards looks briefly conflicted. Draco is as well, honestly—Finnigan’s a fine partner, though a little loud. He’s agile, smarter than he seems, and has an uncanny ability to pull backup plans out of his arse, but he’s absolutely bollocks at research. “Continue fact-checking for now,” Robards decides. “But Auror Malfoy has permission to pull you off of that if more assistance is required.”

“Got it, sir.” Finnigan looks relieved.

“Please move out as soon as possible. I’ll leave the storeroom unlocked so that anyone who hasn’t eaten can pick up ration packs. And this should go without saying, but absolutely no Floo travel. We’ll be releasing a bulletin to the public advising against it as well.”

Groans arise from the few Aurors who hate Apparating, but most everyone else looks relieved to be barred from the Floo. At least Draco isn’t the only one feeling paranoid.

Everyone begins melting away to do what they’ve been assigned. Draco summons his official assignment parchment (it’s a nifty Wheezes invention that constantly updates itself) and lets Finnigan clap him on the shoulder as he follows Potter and Granger back toward Potter’s office. The parchment says nothing new, except—“Potter, come look at this.” He walks faster until he’s matching Potter’s pace.

“What is it?”

“’Possible field intervention may be necessary. Please exercise extreme caution,’” Draco quotes.

“What’s odd about that?” Potter asks.

“These parchments are correct approximately eighty-nine percent of the time.” Granger unrolls hers as well. “George worked with a few True Seers when he developed them. The only problem is that they’re always an understatement, so there’s a good chance we’ll be doing dangerous field work.”

“Not just ‘dangerous’.” Draco frowns. “The ‘exercise extreme caution’ part—we could very well get killed. Are you all right with that, Potter?”

“Hmm. That’s fine, then.” Potter shrugs. Draco is annoyed by his nonchalance, but they’ve got no time to be bickering about safety.

“I’ve contacted the MediaShare,” Granger remarks, referring to the immense system of texts that she has a subscription to (and always urges others to try, much to their varied annoyance). “They’re sending me anything relevant as we speak. We should have answers by tomorrow at the latest.”

-X-

For once in a blue moon, Granger is wrong. Despite having wonderful and extensive knowledge of the Network, its mechanisms, and its layout, there’s very little information on what powers it at all.

And every day, at six in the morning, more people are abducted. Twenty the next day, then thirty—the number increases every morning until there’s finally a widespread panic. The case gets upgraded to a Level One shortly after day three.

Draco, Granger, and Potter are working themselves silly. They’ve relocated to an office without a fireplace just to be safe, but it’s tiny and cramped with the three of them in it. Worse, Draco’s nightmares have started again. It’s partially stress and partially fear with a dash of sleep deprivation added in for good measure, but all of it results in him being miserable and cranky pretty much all of the time. There’s nothing he can do. The case must be solved.

“Go home and get some sleep,” Granger urges him one night after he falls asleep in the middle of a book and wakes up hyperventilating shortly after. “You look like you need the rest without us around.”

“But…” Draco starts to protest, but Potter’s shaking his head at him.

“Go, Draco. We’ll be fine without you for a while.”

Draco gives in, because sleeping will increase his productivity anyway and he desperately wants a shower. “I’ll be back,” he mumbles, then sleepwalks to the nearest Apparition point.

He barely remembers collapsing into bed. When he awakens several hours later, he figures that he may as well shower, and he’s about to do just that when he notices that there’s a light on in the living room. Odd. Heading over to turn it off, he tries to remember when he turned it on in the first place. That train of thought is derailed almost immediately when he walks in the room and yelps in surprise, because there’s a small child in front of the fire—“Merlin, not again. Rachel! I told you not to go near the Floo!”

“But…” Rachel whimpers. “I don’t have anyone to play with me. And Grammy forgot to give me supper last night.”

“It’s three in the morning!” Draco grits his teeth.

“But I’m hungry…”

Draco lets out a long sigh. His worries about the girl are returning, despite the knowledge that he can’t do anything for her. “Didn’t your grandmother read the public bulletin about the Floo?”

Rachel shakes her head. “Grammy lost her glasses again. She can’t read without them.”

Groaning exasperatedly, Draco collapses onto the couch. “Okay, Rachel. I’m going to feed you, and then I’m taking you back home. Do not go anywhere near the Floo. It’s kidnapping people now, do you understand how bad that is?”

Wide eyed, Rachel nods.

“And if you try to use it, it might get you too. So don’t use it. I’m serious,” Draco tells her.

Rachel shivers, slowly frowning. “I’m scared,” she murmurs. She gets up, climbing onto the couch and hiding her face in Draco’s arm.

 _Now_ she’s scared. But at least he seems to have gotten through to her. “Yeah. Me too.”

Draco makes her dinner, and showers while she’s eating (he lets her sit and eat in the hallway because she’s now terrified of the fireplace.) And after that’s done, he goes to block the Floo.

But the Floo resists.

Draco shudders, tries again. But it just isn’t working.

The Floo can’t be blocked. No one is immune.

Feeling slightly panicky, he transfigures his coffee table into a pile of wood, using a Sticking charm to board up the Floo. It’ll do for now.

He leads Rachel to the car (she sulks, but comes obediently) and drives her home. Her grandmother is asleep, but he makes Rachel promise to pass along the message about the Floo.

And then he drives back to the makeshift office, because seeing Rachel had reminded him of something Potter had said weeks ago.

“Potter.” He bursts into the room, making both Granger and Potter jump. He doesn’t apologize—no time for that. “Do you remember when you were questioning Rachel, and you mentioned something about the wards not resisting you?”

“Er, I think so… oh. Oh. Draco. Holy fuck, that’s it.” He stands up, eyes wide. “I can’t believe I didn’t remember—oh no, _field work_ , it all makes sense now.” He shakes his head, grabbing his wand. “We need to go speak to Robards, and then we need to leave.”

“What’s going on, Harry?” Granger gets up nonetheless, and they all head out the door.

“It was a reference I read once, a long time ago. I wasn’t sure if it was valid or not because the source wasn’t the most reputable, but then the wards at Draco’s changed to let me in after I misdirected there. And I don’t really know exactly how it works but the point is that the power behind the Floo is exactly like the power behind wards.”

“Oh!” Granger gasps.

“Okay.” Draco nods. “That’s great, Potter. But where exactly are we going?”

“You know how the wards have a cornerstone, and you have to be in contact with the cornerstone to be able to change them?” Potter asks, turning a corner so quickly that he almost slams into one of the Cleaning Wizards.

“Mhmm?” Draco sidesteps around the disgruntled wizard, raising a hand in apology.

“Well, I’m betting the Floo is the same way.”

“So we have to find the cornerstone?” Granger sounds out of breath, because they’re moving almost at a run.

“We already know where it is. It’s the Mother Hearth,” Potter explains.

That stops Draco’s train of thought in its tracks. “Wait. Is that where we’re going? You can _visit_ the Mother Hearth?”

“I think so, yes.” Potter nods. “From what I’ve read, it's in one of the passageways at Gringotts.”

They reach the door to the Auror department, and Potter stops suddenly, turning to Draco. “Hold on. Is your house off of Diagon, by any chance?”

“Yeah, it’s three streets from the main Alley. Why?”

“Of course it is… I knew there was a heavier incidence around Diagon!” Potter exclaims. “It’s all centered around Gringotts!”

“You mean the missing people are at the Mother Hearth?” Granger connects the dots.

“If I’m right, then yes.” Potter smiles grimly.

Hope rises in Draco, even though he’d thought it’d expired long ago. They can do this.

They make their way to Robards’ office as the clock strikes five.

-X-

“Absolutely not.” Robards shakes his head.

“Why not?” Potter asks, obviously annoyed.

“Because there’s no plan, you all have no idea what you’re doing, and there’s no backup yet. Once we have all of those, you can make your move, but not before.”

“But we need to go before more people get taken!” Potter argues.

“And risk the lives of the only people who have any sort of idea of what’s happening? No. We need to have a briefing. We’ll make it as fast as possible, obviously, but these are steps that need to be taken, Overseer Potter.”

“That’s ridiculous, Robards,” Draco finally speaks out. “It’s too close to six, and it’s only a hypothesis that those who are missing are at the Hearth. What do we do if we miss the time limit, and those people end up dead?”

“That’s just a risk we’ll have to take,” Robards says stubbornly.

Draco turns around and walks out of Robards’ office, then leaves the department entirely. He’s having trouble seeing straight; he needs to calm down and rationalize.

Potter walks in on him sitting in the break room several minutes later. Draco’s staring at his poorly brewed Ministry coffee, heart running much faster than is probably healthy and dreading every tick of the clock.

“Hey,” Potter murmurs, and even at a time like this, Draco’s mind skips a step at the sound of Potter’s voice. He supposes he should probably get over Potter, as it’s likely they won’t see each other after the case is over, and Potter doesn’t seem to like him enough to try. But if suppression of feelings makes them worsen over time, he may never get over Potter. The sheer amount of history between them makes it seem impossible.

He wonders if Potter’s ever truly wanted him, and if so, what made him stop. Because Potter pretty much admitted to watching him, and that has to count for something, right?

“Hello, Harry,” he finally responds.

Out of the corner of his eye, Potter briefly bites his lip. “Draco,” Potter says, and his voice cracks a little, making him grin sheepishly.

Draco chuckles. “Yeah?”

“Do you think this’ll turn out all right?” Potter’s voice becomes sober.

Draco shrugs and turns back to his coffee. He doesn’t honestly know. ‘This’ is a very broad term, after all; the case may end up okay, but that doesn’t mean their relationship will. (Of course, he doubts Potter’s really asking about their relationship. That’s just wishful thinking on Draco’s part.)

He glances at the clock. It’s already five thirty, and his heart clenches with involuntary fear.

It must show in his face because Potter grimaces. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” Draco lies. “Just… thinking about Rachel. I should have kept her with me. She came over again. Her grandmother didn’t even read the notice about the Floo, and she didn’t get supper last night because her grandmother forgot, and… it’s just so _aggravating_ ,” he growls.

Potter’s eyes widen. “Is her grandmother abusive?”

“No, not really.” Draco shakes his head. “But I don’t think she should be the one taking care of her, all the same. Old age is getting to her, and honestly I think she’d be better off in Mungo’s ward for the elderly at this point.”

“I never knew.” Potter looks dismayed. “You should talk to Hermione. She’s dealt with child services before. Maybe she’ll know something?”

Draco’s already shaking his head before Potter finishes his sentence. “I already spoke to her. There’s nothing I can do.”

Potter opens his mouth, then closes it again. He reaches over and squeezes Draco’s hand. “You tried, for her, though. That’s… really grand of you.”

And he wishes they could sit there forever, but having Potter touching him like this is making it hard to think.

He has to let go. Time is ticking.

“Should we be at the briefing?” Draco stands and pulls away.

Potter’s face is unreadable. “Hermione’s got it. Robards said that we should plan so they could leave immediately after they’re done.”

Draco nods, then suddenly remembers something. Fear lances through him. “Potter… You said it’s at Gringott’s? Well how are we supposed get a vault key?”

“I don’t… fuck!” Potter curses suddenly. “I didn’t even think about there being a vault. There’s no records of a key in anywhere that I’ve seen… oh, Merlin sod it all!”

“I suppose we can just go to Gringott’s and ask,” Draco suggests, but his confidence in their situation is slowly ebbing away.

There’s no time to worry, though, because then Granger walks in the room and it’s time to leave.

“The briefing went all right,” Granger tells them as they head briskly to the nearest Apparition point. “I just gave them the ‘need-to-know-basis’ info. We’ve got backup already heading to a few of the other Apparition points.”

“Oy!” A voice from behind them says, and Draco looks back to see Finnigan running after them. “Robards said I should come along with you, if that’s all right.”

“I suppose.” Draco eyes Granger and Potter for confirmation. They both nod.

Secretly, he’s relieved. He and Finnigan aren’t partners for nothing, and this way if they need to split up, they can do it evenly so that no one gets left behind.

They reach the Apparition point. Draco goes first, landing with a resounding crack in the Alley; the others are right on his tail, and so they all gasp almost in unison.

The street is packed. There are people milling around everywhere, some just sitting on the sidewalk. Draco tries to think when he’d last been to the Alley proper, and finds that he can’t remember. It certainly hadn’t looked like this. There are people that are sleeping, some that are praying. All of them look scared.

He shakes himself, trying to vanquish as much fear as possible. (It doesn’t really work.) Nonetheless, he has to get going.

“Follow me.” He starts walking, shoving through the crowds so that they can pass.

Somewhere, a clock strikes six.

-X-

“What do you mean, it doesn’t _exist_?!” Potter nearly explodes.

“It means exactly what it means, Mr. Potter. And please refrain from shouting in the lobby.” The goblin glares at them over his desk. His perfectly shined nameplate reads ‘Ganguk’, and he seems to be just as lovely as every other goblin that Draco has encountered.

“This isn’t going to get us anywhere,” Granger murmurs. And so they leave (before Potter accidentally commits murder, that is).

They walk out the doors of Gringott’s. A beautiful dawn is breaking over the horizon, but the scene before them is nothing but bleak. So many people, all of them scared, all of them functionally homeless for the time being. Draco’s stomach twists.

“So what the fuck are we supposed to do now?” Potter spits.

Even Granger doesn’t have an answer. If Draco looks closely, he can tell that she’s scared, too. It’s in the lines of her face and the set of her stance.

“We need to find a way to get there. Which is difficult, since ‘there’ sounds like more of a myth than anything,” Draco points out.

“Hang on.” Finnigan scratches his head. “We’re going to the Mother Hearth, right?”

The other three nod.

“Well then… can’t we just Floo there?” Finnigan asks.

“That…” Potter squints at Finnigan. “You know, Seamus, that might just work.” He sounds surprised to even be uttering the words, but it doesn’t matter. They’re out of other options.

Granger sends a Patronus to Robards, because protocol is protocol, and they head back to Gringott’s to request Floo access. It takes some convincing. The goblins have boarded up the large hearth in the lobby, just as Draco did with his own, and they’re reluctant to unboard it.

Finally, after some ingenious persuasion on Granger’s part, Ganguk relents. “It’s your life,” he mutters, spelling the boards away from the hearth.

Potter lights a fire, and they crowd around it nervously. The crackling isn’t soothing as it should be. Every snap makes Draco want to jump.

“You all ready?” Granger asks, reaching for the Floo powder on the mantel.

“Aye-aye.” Finnigan salutes half-heartedly.

Draco is about to nod, but a thought crosses his mind. “One quick thing,” he interjects. He turns to Potter. “I understand that you have an idiot’s sense of bravery, but you must listen to any commands that Granger or Finnigan or I happen to give you. We’ve all been officially trained for this sort of situation. You haven’t. Is that clear?”

“I… fine.” Potter looks faintly stunned.

Granger eyes Draco approvingly before throwing the first handful of Floo Powder.

They take the plunge.

-X-

It’s in a dank, musty cave that they reappear one by one. A few _Lumos_ ’s later and they can almost see their surroundings; there seems to be nowhere to go except for a narrow passageway to their right.

“I’ll lead. Finnigan, you have my back. Potter next, and then Granger can take the rear,” he instructs. “Any objections?”

“None,” Granger answers for them, and they slip into formation.

It’s an uncomfortable walk—the passage only becomes narrower as they continue, and shorter as well, so that they have to stoop to avoid hitting the ceiling. It feels like an eternity before they can make out a light in the distance.

“ _Nox_ ,” Draco whispers, and the others follow his lead. He slows to a stop. “No talking after this point. We want the element of surprise on our side if there’s anything malicious in there. Be ready for anything. Potter, if it comes to combat, I assume you know how to defend yourself?”

“I’ve been in combat before,” Potter mutters, but he nods his head anyway.

Draco steels himself. “Let’s go.”

Slowly, stealthily, they continue toward the end of the passageway. They stop at the end so that Draco can peer around the corner.

The room that the passage empties into is enormous. Stalactites and stalagmites abound, and there’s an endless dripping that echoes in the vast cave. And near the other end of the room, seated, are the hundreds of people that had been lost.

Draco breathes a quiet sigh of relief.

But the middle of the room is what draws his attention next—there’s a large, ornate chest, and beside it sits a woman. And as luck would have it, she’s looking right at them.

“I know you’re there.” She tilts her head. “Come out where I can see you.”

Draco stays put. There’s no reason to give her anything, yet—

“I’m serious. I have no problems with ending the lives of any one of those people over there.” She gestures to the crowd. “And it’s easy enough to collapse the tunnel you just came through. I’ve already got anti-Apparition wards up, so don’t make this harder on yourselves.”

Fuck it all, there’s no way around it. Draco glances behind him for a consensus, and then they have no choice to walk into the room, wands raised at the ready.

On cue, the woman waves her wand, and the entrance to the tunnel behind them collapses. There’s no escape.

“Now where were we?” she asks, seemingly nonchalant. “For starters, I think you’d better drop your wands.” And before they can react, she casts an _Expelliarmus_ , and their only weapons fly out of their hands.

Draco thinks back to his assignment parchment, feeling bare and vulnerable without his wand at his fingertips. “Exercise extreme caution,” it had said. Sometimes he wishes the parchment wasn’t always so right.

“Good Aurors. I like people who listen. So tell me—how exactly were you planning to thwart me? I’m assuming that’s what you’re here to do, no?”

Potter clears his throat. “What exactly are you trying to do?”

The woman laughs sharply. “You came here, not even knowing what was going on? And you, you’re not even an Auror, are you? Oh, wait. It’s the famous _Harry Potter_ ,” she says mockingly.

Draco grits his teeth. He keeps trying to think of a way out, but all of their options have been stripped from them, and— _oh God._ Anguish traces through him, and Granger shrieks in outrage, as the woman begins snapping their wands one by one.

“Don’t feel too bad. You won’t be coming out of here alive, anyhow,” the woman assures them.

Devoid of hope, Draco studies her. She’s fair-skinned and petite, dressed fashionably but not outrageously. He wouldn’t have looked twice if he’d seen her on the street. Looks really reveal nothing about the person behind them, and this particular person just happens to be a psychopath.

The woman stares at them. “Well, aren’t you curious about what’s in here? I’ve told them all." She gestures to the chest behind her. “I suppose you four deserve to know as well.”

Warily, they edge closer. Granger pushes to the front. “Is that what I think it is?” she asks, pushing her hair out of her face.

“Hmm? Oh, the chest?” The woman looks over to it. “If you’re thinking of the Confinement Chest that went missing in 1430, then yes, this is it. Kudos to you for memorizing your history textbook. It’s been down here for centuries. But we don’t care about that, do we? We care about what’s inside it.” She gives them a small smile that doesn’t reach her eyes.

“Well, what’s inside it?” Finnigan asks the obvious question.

“The true Mother Hearth, of course.” She waves her wand at the chest, and they all flinch as the chest becomes transparent.

There’s some sort of _being_ in there, it seems, something shimmery that hurts to look at. Now that he’s paying attention, Draco can feel the immense power that’s coming from the thing. Uncanny feelings spiral through him. He feels both uncomfortable and soothed all at once, and he doesn’t know what to think. The thing doesn’t seem to have a body at all. Somehow, he gets the feeling that it’s both very old and very wise.

“She’s interesting, isn’t she?” The woman spells the chest opaque once more. “She controls the Floo. Long ago, someone locked her in there so they could try to harness her power without her interference. But she resisted, and the man died trying.” She tosses her hair. “It was silly of him. I wouldn’t have done it, but I’m grateful he did, because it makes my job a lot easier.”

“Your job?” Draco prompts.

“Well, hobby, I suppose.” She grins. “I collect power, you see. I wish you could see my whole collection, but I left it at home.” She chuckles at her own jibe. “You won’t have heard of me, by the way. I have many pseudonyms, and I don’t make it a habit of mentioning them to people unless it’s truly necessary.”

Draco’s gut twists. She’s an Untraceable. He’d heard stories of them when he was young, people who were so cunning or powerful that they could simply cease to exist in the eyes of the public. There won’t be records of her anywhere, he already knows.

The woman seems absolutely mad, the kind of crazy that’s worse than all the others because of the self-righteousness mounted behind it. He looks to the people behind her, trying to deduce if she’s killed anyone, but the room’s too large for him to see.

Unexpectedly, as he’s squinting at the crowd, he hears his name.

“Mister Malfoy!” a small voice calls, and he suddenly wants to cry.

_Rachel._

_No!_

He’s helpless. He couldn’t help her before, and now he never will.

“It looks like you have a fan.” The woman raises her eyebrows. “Go ahead. Go on over, the lot of you. Tour’s over.”

Wordlessly, Draco complies, making a beeline for the little girl. He can hear the others following behind him, but they only register dimly against the perpetual slate of hopelessness

Rachel starts sobbing, and he’s reminded of when they met so many weeks ago. But those tears had been annoying, almost comical. This time, Draco almost is crying himself.

He kneels and gathers her into his arms. “It’s all right,” he murmurs, even though it isn’t.

“I want to go home…” she cries.

“I know,” he whispers, and then he can’t bear to speak to her any longer.

He feels a light touch on his arm. It’s Potter, and his eyes are red. Granger’s next to him, already sniffled, and Finnigan sighs from somewhere behind Draco.

Potter breaths a shaky sigh. “Draco. I don’t…” He shakes his head. “You’re a problem, you know?”

“Well that’s awfully nice of you.” Draco frowns at him. He rocks Rachel in his lap.

“No, I mean, not like that—I get too invested in things, you know? Relationships, especially, and you. I’ve always been invested in you,” he admits. “And I knew I’d want to do reckless things if we started dating, especially if you were in danger, but you know what? It doesn’t fucking matter, because none of us can do anything right now.”

Draco squeezes his eyes shut. Potter wants him. He’s glad, but _Merlin_ that’s a loaded notion because there’s no happiness in it when their only future is destruction.

“So I regret that. Not being with you, I mean." Potter shakes his head sadly. “So…” He flicks his eyes back to Draco’s, and Draco stares into them, heart thrumming wonderfully. At least there’s this.

Potter leans closer, and Draco closes his eyes.

He allows Potter to kiss him, even with Granger and Finnigan and Rachel there. He’s past caring. Potter doesn’t taste too brilliant right now, and his lips are chapped horribly, but the kiss sends emotions ratcheting around in Draco’s body nonetheless.

They pull apart after some time, and Draco sits and revels in Potter’s presence for a moment before he’s able to gain the courage to look around again. The evil woman is sitting next to the chest, looking bored. If only they could all rush her at once—but it’s impossible to plan that sort of thing, because the room is too loud for secrets. And no doubt she could do something devastating to them with the Mother Hearth if they ever bother to try.

He turns to look at Finnigan and frowns. Finnigan looks like he’s in pain. He’s kneeling like the rest of them, but he’s scowling, arm pressed against his arched back.

“What’s wrong?” Draco asks.

“I think I hurt my back when we were walking through that tunnel,” Finnigan answers, with a painful sounding groan to match.

“That’s rough, mate,” Potter says.

“I just need to stretch it out properly, I think.” Finnigan sighs. “Let me… ah, there, that’s better.” He smiles.

And then he whips something out from behind his back, aims it at the woman, and triggers it with a loud crack.

The woman slides to the floor.

-X-

“A gun. I can’t believe you brought a gun,” Granger repeats for possibly the fifth time that day. The room is filled with a chattering racket, as the rest of the Auror brigade broke through the barricade shortly after Finnigan’s ballsy stunt. They’re sitting in a corner, watching the others work while they recuperate from the stress of being held hostage. Everyone’s giving the chest in the center of the room a wide berth, as it should be. Draco has Rachel’s hand in his right, and Potter’s in his left. To be honest, he doesn’t exactly plan on letting go of either of them.

“I can’t believe he aimed it correctly,” Draco remarks, and Finnigan guffaws.

“You got that right, mate. And it was stuck in my belt, too. I almost panicked there for a moment.”

Rachel squeezes Draco’s hand. “I’m hungry.” She lets out a long sigh. Draco’s continually startled by how well she seems to be taking the event. From what she’d said, she’d been asleep when the Floo had taken her away and had woken up to the enormous cave.

“I was very brave,” she had told them afterwards, and Draco’s inclined to agree.

He’s not sure what to do about her grandmother, but he intends to explore more options once they get away from this mess. If Finnigan can pull a gun out of his arse, there must be something that Draco can do to at least help her get proper care. Maybe he can hire them a full time babysitter or something. It’s worth a shot.

“There you all are.” Shacklebolt strides over to them. Draco hadn’t even seen him come into the room. “Fantastic work, Finnigan.”

Finnigan’s ears flush, and he ducks his head. “Thank you, sir.”

“And to the rest of you, too. That woman was a menace.” His mouth tightens. “I’m sorry to say that there were a few casualties. No one was allowed nourishment while they were here, so…” he trails off.

Draco feels a pang of mourning. They hadn’t saved everyone, then.

“Unfortunately, what’s done is done. I’m arranging for you all to be questioned as fast as possible so you can get some rest. I’ll be handling the press for this personally, so don’t feel worried about too much media involvement.”

“Thank you, Minister.” Granger looks relieved. “Question, though—did you find out who that woman was?”

Shacklebolt looks immensely regretful. “I’m afraid not. As Auror Malfoy pointed out when the rest of the Aurors arrived, she was indeed an Untraceable. We’ll look, of course, but it’s not likely that we’ll find any information on her, especially without any sort of name.”

It’s as Draco suspected. They’ll never know anything more, except that she lusted for power and paid for it with her life.

“Sir, the Auror on duty up at HQ just received an owl from Ollivander Co. They’re offering free replacement wands to any and all of the victims.”

Draco’s wand. Out of everything that had happened that night, his wand was the most irreplaceable. It’s the third one he’s had, and it’d really been starting to grow on him. Luckily, he has a spare at home.

“Thanks, sir!” Finnigan beams.

The others echo his sentiment. Shacklebolt smiles at the Auror, waving him on to spread the news to others, then squints down at Rachel. “Isn’t that the girl who was with you a few weeks ago, Auror Malfoy?”

“Yes it is, unfortunately for her.” Draco squeezes her hand. Rachel smiles at him, childhood innocence shielding her from the brunt of the situation, and Draco realizes that he doesn’t know if he ever wants her to grow up.

“It was an awful coincidence that she got caught up in this more than once.” Shacklebolt shakes his head. “I’m sure you’ll see to it that she gets home safely, yes?”

“Of course, Minister,” Draco says.

“Thank you for your work, everyone.” Shacklebolt salutes them before striding off.

There’s an awkward silence before Granger breaks it. “A gun, honestly!” she exclaims, and Finnigan laughs before once again retelling the tale that’s quickly gotten old (seeing as they were all there when it happened.)

“Mister Draco?” Rachel tugs his sleeve.

“Yeah?” he looks down at her.

“When we get home, can you take me to the park? Pleeeeease?” She leans toward him, and he swears the stars are caught in her eyes.

“All right,” he says obligingly, and she grins.

“Yay! Yay! Oh, and Harry can come too,” she adds coyly.

“Only if he wants to,” Draco interjects, casting a sidelong glance at the man beside him. Only if he wants Draco.

Time slows to almost a standstill because Potter’s looking at him the way he’d looked at him that first night, back before all of this. Draco swallows nervously, because he still doesn’t know what Potter wants, and he’s almost afraid to hear it.

But then a smile spreads languidly over Potter’s face. “Yes,” he answers the unspoken question. “I think I do.”

The warmth that washes over him is almost enough to erase the tension from Draco’s last few hours, and he basks in the glow of it, the sensation of Potter’s hand firmly in his.

He looks over at the Mother Hearth. Potter had set her straight shortly after Finnegan had killed the woman controlling her, but she’s still captive inside her prison. He wonders about her future, wonders if someone will set her free. Maybe that person will be Potter, for all he knows.

It doesn’t matter, though; Draco’s staying out of it. He’s had enough of Floo travel for a lifetime.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! All comments are extremely welcome either here or on [Livejournal](http://hd-fan-fair.livejournal.com/103813.html).


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